Root s-on and want to flash roms? READ THIS

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after typing this out more times than i can count,i have decided to make up a thread for it,and stick it up top. hopefully this will end some of the confusion about fastboot booting recovery,why its better,and what you have to do if you opt not to take advantage of its benefits.

if you have not rooted yet, consider using the guide here,as ive tried to eliminate some of the confusion from htcdev's page,and using it will give you some basic knowledge and tools that you will use in happily modding your s-on device. youll also potentially have an understanding of fastboot booting your recovery into phone memory,as it is the same thing as what the guide instructions are for a "temporary recovery".

most folks that have come from other devices are used to the following sequence of events:
1)root phone
2)install a custom recovery(generally clockwork mod,or Amon_Ra)
3)booting to that recovery to make and restore backups,flash roms,etc. since the root method generally gave access to all the phones different memory partitions,many of wich are modifiable via the custom recovery.

even worse,are folks who have come from different devices and used an app called "rom manager" to manipulate things from within the booted operating system. i am not a fan of rom manager period,even on phones that it works on.

unfortunately,the above is a recipe for disaster on any s-on,high end htc device.

to begin,a few words about htcdev
htcdev is htc's answer to the publics cry for unlocked bootloaders,and the ability to modify and install custom operating systems on their htc devices.

basically,you send information to htc,and they provide an unlock token that is reusable,but unique to your device. this changes the locked lettering at the top of your hboot screen to unlocked,and gives you access to the /boot,/system,and /recovery partitions only of your phone. it is not s-off by any means,and there are still alot of checks being done by the phone,wich lead to disadvantages. most notably,you cannot change any other partitions. hboot,radios,and splash screens are protected and off limits. you also cannot roll backwards in software build numbers and firmware if you flash a leaked rom and dont like it.

there are a couple of advantages.

1)unlike the underground exploits used in the past,htcdev will always work. you dont need to worry about unrooting and not being able to root again. if you need to relock your bootloader and flash factory firmware,you will always be able to re-unlock with your original unlock token.

this makes it convenient for users that only want root access so that they can run a few root apps(titanium backup,wifi tether) and delete some bloatware. the folks that like to run stock,and recieve OTA updates can easily do so by keeping the STOCK recovery on the phone.

as long as the stock recovery is in place,you are not in danger of an OTA messing up your phone.

rezound user: but,wait! wont accepting an OTA break my root?!
scotty: yes,but thats not a big deal. after the OTA has finished,you can quite easily relaunch your temporary recovery,and re-flash your root files,just as you did when you first rooted. re-rooting is easily accomplished,and therefore nothing to be concerned with.

2)the other big advantage of an htcdev unlocked s-on bootloader,is that since the bootloader is protecting itself,and the radios,it is nearly impossible to hard-brick(i.e.,unrecoverable) device with software flashes. any damaged to the phones filesystem are almost always fixed by RELOCKING the bootloader,and running an RUU(factory signed software package)

what this means is that,unlike your s-off evo 4g,thunderbolt,inc 1,or just about any other htc device you may have messed with,the rom that you flash from a recovery that is permantly installed on your phone cannot install the boot image. since the boot image houses the kernel, the roms kernel is not being installed along with the rest of the rom.

this means that if your rom requires a different kernel than what is on your phone,it will not boot. it will hang indefinately at the splash screen.

there are a couple options to work around this handicap with s-on phones:

2)flash the kernel manually. it can be done with the command fastboot flash boot or it can be done by placing the boot image inside a PH98IMG file and flashing it in hboot.

PH98IMG flashing is a PITA on an s-on phone,in my honest opinion. the information on the "android info" text document inside the file must contain the correct info or the phone will not let the file flash. this leads to much aggravation,confusion,and an overall very bad rom flashing experience

and now the best for last:3) fastboot boot your recovery into phone memory

this involves,basically,placing your recovery image inside the folder that contains adb and fastboot,booting the phone to fastboot,and the launching recovery into phone memory by entering the command:fastboot boot recoveryname.img

do not confuse this with the fastboot flash command.

fastboot boot is taking an image,and booting it right up on the phone.

fastboot flash is permantly installing an image into the phones filesystem.

ok,pay attention guys,cause im tired of typing this over and over in different threads

*if you use fastboot boot to launch your recovery into phone memory,then recovery CAN write to the boot partition,making rom flashing on your s-on device just like rom flashing on an s-off device.

i.e.,launching recovery from fastboot lets the rom install the kernel,and requires no seperate kernel flashing. this means that when you are following a rom developers install instructions,you can follow the set for s-off devices.

why does this work?!

well,an oversimplified explanation is this:
-fastboot is part of the bootloader,wich can write to the /boot partition
-launching recovery from bootloader,makes the recoverys operations work thru the bootloader.
-hence,launched recovery can write boot image. hooray! :smokingsomb:

all the above applies to bakcups as well. you canot restore a backup from the permenent recovery if it contains a different kernel. just like flashing a rom. all the above info in this post applies to restoring a rom as well.

last and not least,some more detailed instructions

if you rooted with my guide,then you have seen this before. its basically the directions to "temporarily flash recovery"

for those that have rooted via other means,you can modify these directions to fit whatever folder you have adb/fastboot in,or you just use these directions:

first thing you need is drivers for adb to see your phone. if you have htc sync installed,you should allready have drivers. if not,you can install htc sync,or install these modified htc drivers from revolutionary (i recomand revolutionary drivers)

1)prepair ADB
-unzip your mini-adb.zip file. this is native funtionality in windows 7. you otherwise may need a utility such as "7-zip" to extract,or unzip it. place the unzipped folder onto the root of your C\ drive on your PC(sorry, you mac guys will need to develop this for yourself,i dont have a mac). root means the top level,not inside any folders. so just copy and paste,or drag and drop the folder onto C with everything else that is there. rename it to "mini-adb_vigor" since youll be putting some vigor(rezound) specific files in here. you actually can call it whatver you want,but directions from here forward will assume this folder to be named "mini-adb_vigor"
-open a command window. on windows 7,click the start bubble in the lower left and type "command" in the search box. xp i believe is similar or the same. doing this should open a small black command window.
-change to your mini-adb_vigor directory. type the following at the prompt in your cmd window:

cd c:\mini-adb_vigor

2)launch a temporary recovery:
-move the image file you downloaded above for amon RA and place it into the mini-adb_vigor folder.

-type in your cmd window,or copy/paste the commands that are in bold

-check the md5 of your recovery image:

md5sums<recoveryname>.img

i.e.,if youre using an image named recovery-ra-vigor-3.15-gnm,then your command will be:md5sums recovery-ra-vigor-3.15-gnm.img

**make sure the resulting md5 matches the one that drellisdee lists for the image that you downloaded. **
(if you use 3.15,then the md5 should match: 9d127cde10b68de5e424aaea2d4a4357)

-enable usb debugging on your phone and plug it in,charge only mode.

-check for connectivity:

adb devices

-it should reply with your serial number. if so,then:

adb reboot bootloader

-this will boot your phone into "fastboot" wich is a white screen with coloered letters.

-youll see a (really fast) green status bar on the top right as your PC sends the recovery to your phone. youll then see the HTC splash screen,then your recovery.

now that youre recovery is running,you have lots of options. you can mount usb storage to move things on and off the sd card if you need to. you can also flash the main version tool if you need to: main version tool.

note that once recovery is running,you can unplug from the PC if you want to flash your rom from the couch,ktichen table,or wherever

you can now restore a backup,or flash a rom. be aware that if you are still on gingerbread firmware(hboot 2.09.0000, 2.10.000, 2.11.0000) and are flashing an ICS rom,you will need to flash a special patch for the rom to work,AFTER flashing the rom: old firmware patch

last and not least,a couple notes:
-to paste into the cmd window,you must right click/paste. you cannot control/v
-to copy from the cmd window,right click. click mark. highlight everything to copy in white. now hit enter,or right click again.

holler if you have more questions

*there will be some refinements to this in a bit,ive got to step out for a bit...

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Does con247's script for flashing firmware while S-ON still work? I was just curious, not actually considering this but have read talk about the .7 kernel supposedly helping with heat. Also playing with setcpu over the weekend (don't have it enabled just going through the menus) and saw mention of a smartass kernel. Which I assume isn't available for ICS because HTC hasn't released the source yet?

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Does con247's script for flashing firmware while S-ON still work? I was just curious, not actually considering this but have read talk about the .7 kernel supposedly helping with heat. Also playing with setcpu over the weekend (don't have it enabled just going through the menus) and saw mention of a smartass kernel. Which I assume isn't available for ICS because HTC hasn't released the source yet?

Click to expand...

cons script should still work. youre definately proficient enuff with the cmd window you dont need it,tho... all you have to do is fastboot flash boot bootimagename.img

keep in mind that the .7 kernel is for sense 3.6,and thus not compatible with viper.

correct,lots of good things should start happening once we have kernel source

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Jan 9, 2011

So i am curious. i am unrooted running the stock ics rom verizon gave me lol. do i still follow these steps if i want to run a different rom? htc unlock, install recovery, do a backup and then choose a rom? also is there a step by step way to get this phone s-off running the stock ics rom. thanks/

if all you want to do is run the stock rom,you dont really need to be s-off. htcdev works fine to add superuser access and you can even leave the stock recovery on the phone so it will recieve OTAs without issue.

if you want to flash roms,and are intimidated by the wire trick,you can always use the directions here to flash roms while s-on.

As you see...My Rezound has S-ON and I need your help to flash RUU_ICS_Global_Plus_4.03.605.2_v.1.2_odexed.zip without memories (internal and external) problem (Phone Storage: Unavailable and SD-Card: Unavailable)...Can I flash Old_Firmware_Patch.zip to fix the memories problem?

also keep in mind that flashing from permanent amon will not install the kernel,so if the rom youre looking at does not contain the stock kernel,then the flash will not work unless you fastboot boot amon.

you can use the cleanwipe script if you want,but you dont really need to. despite the recomendations of some folks(devs included ) to do so,a plain old wipe of data/cache/dalvik cache works just fine. electronic wiping does not leave behind bits of info,like crumbs on a counter,that need swept up multiple times

Jan 24, 2011

My Rezound has Build Number: 2.01.605.11 (Old GBE Firmware) not 3.14.605.12 because it is from ConROMV6...in other words...I have the original Build Number...that's why I need your help with Old_Firmware_Patch.zip

My Rezound has Build Number: 2.01.605.11 (Old GBE Firmware) not 3.14.605.12 because it is from ConROMV6...in other words...I have the original Build Number...that's why I need your help with Old_Firmware_Patch.zip

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Thank you so much scotty85 i have been worried alot after unlocking my HTC Desire HD from HTCDEV which really sucks. I love you so much for the whole Guide s-on and want to flash roms?. Thanks alot. It really worked.

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Hey Scotty, got a question for you. I've followed the directions to get S-On unlocked. Now I've flashed Newt's One rom, thought it was cool, then flashed Nil's business. Didn't like the keyboard or the battery. So when I went to try to flash back to Newts, my hboot keeps trying to update some "pg" file before I can even select recovery... (if I said "no" to the update, it wouldn't let me go back to bootloader, just had me reboot). I had to take my sd card out and delete this file from my sd card before it allowed me to go to hboot and select recovery. So I put Nil's back on since Newt's was now stuck on the loading screen.

Using Nil's rom I was able to use my computer to get back into the bootloader with the commands. I now wanted to try Ineffabillis Deus which stated I needed to fastboot flash the boot.img. So I extracted the boot.img from the downloaded rom zip to the folder in your tutorial, then typed "fastboot flash boot boot.img" just like the Rom's site says to do for S-On. The phone then rebooted and went to Nil's rom, so I then restarted the phone in recovery, and flashed Ineffabilis Deus from recovery, it said the installation was successful but now I'm stuck on the loading screen again.

Am I doing something wrong here? Why is it that Nil's is the only rom that will install properly now and everything else gets stuck on the loading screen after installing a rom?

Now since Indeffabilis Deus is not loading, when I Power+Volume down into hboot, before I can go to recovery, it automatically asks if I want to start update for [1] BOOT (guess that was the boot.img), when I press no, I have to reboot again ;( Guess I need to delete that from the SDcard again on my computer..."

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well,if you are flashing roms from a permantly installed recovery,then you have somewhat missed the basic idea of this thread if you fastboot boot your recovery into memory as described in the OP,you shouldnt have any prollems,as long as youre doing a full wipe with each install,and the rom is scripted for the s off crowd(to let recovery install the kernel)

your experience with the PH98IMG file on the sd is exactly i why i dont care for the s-on scripts that are depositing the PH98IMG containing the boot image onto your sd card,in attempts to make it easier to install the kernel,and not have to be plugged into a PC to do it. IMO it just makes things more confusing.

you basically have 3 options:1) launch recovery into memory as described in the OP,and flash the rom

3)if the rom youre installing is putting a PH98IMG on the sd card,and booting you to bootloader after the rom installs,select bootloader with the power button(wich will take you to fastboot) then say yes to allow the update,wich will flash the kernel. after the phone boots,maks sure you delete PH98IMG immediately,by plugging in tothe PC,or by using a file manager on the phone.

however you choose to do it,make sure to do a full wipe prior to rom install,wich involves:
1)wipe data/factory reset
2)wipe cache
3)wipe dalvik cache
4) optionaly wipe boot and system,just make sure you do not do this after youve manually flashed the boot image

in a nutshell,your roms are hanging either becasue:
-you have a mismatched or no boot image
or
-you have not done proper wipes

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Ahhh I think I see where I was messing up, was a lot of information i was taking in and I missed this from the OP

"i.e.,launching recovery from fastboot lets the rom install the kernel,and requires no seperate kernel flashing. this means that when you are following a rom developers install instructions,you can follow the set for s-off devices."

So basically, since I perma flashed my recovery I don't have to unzip the boot.img and fastboot flash it? I think the way I'm understanding this now is, I have to use the computer to fastboot into recovery, then I can unplug it and wipe/factory reset everything, then install from sd zip file? And that should work? Or am I suppose to use the computer to fastboot into recovery, then flash the boot.img, then install the rom from Amon-ra?

Also after I perma flashed my recovery, hboot now shows "TAMPERED" in black above the "UNLOCKED" is this normal?

Also, if I want to go back to the stock rom but stay Unlocked S-on, do I have to download that and flash it?

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Ahhh I think I see where I was messing up, was a lot of information i was taking in and I missed this from the OP

"i.e.,launching recovery from fastboot lets the rom install the kernel,and requires no seperate kernel flashing. this means that when you are following a rom developers install instructions,you can follow the set for s-off devices."

I think the way I'm understanding this now is, I have to use the computer to fastboot into recovery, then I can unplug it and wipe/factory reset everything, then install from sd zip file? And that should work? correct. that should work

Also after I perma flashed my recovery, hboot now shows "TAMPERED" in black above the "UNLOCKED" is this normal?yup,perfectly normal. tampered comes from installing a custom recovery,and will disapear after an RUU.

Also, if I want to go back to the stock rom but stay Unlocked S-on, do I have to download that and flash it?

Click to expand...

the easiest way will be to download and flash a stock rom in recovery. the longer option would be to relock,run a full RUU,then re-unlock.

keep in mind that installing amon permantly does not affect your ability to fastboot boot it into memory. there is nothing wrong with having recovery permantly installed,just make sure you use fastboot to launch it when you want to flash a rom.

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Scotty - You have helped me greatly to root my sensation in another thread and advised me to look here with regards to flashing a new ROM with s-on so here I am. It is because your guides are so clear, straight forward and easy to understand that I am asking your advice/opinion on the following :-

I saw this ROM on another site which claims to be able to -turn your HTC Sensation into powerful HTC Sensation XE with Beats Audio technology and 1.5 GHz dual core! which is indeed fantastic and kind of what i wanted to achieve by rooting my phone, i.e. make it run faster. In your opinion is this possible?

If so, it also says --- It's necessary to flash new firmware package before flashing this ROM --- however your guide doesn't mention flashing new firmware as far as i can see.

As i said, your advice has helped me get to this point so I value your advice/opinion on this - also if there is a different ROM you would suggest then please let me know

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Scotty - You have helped me greatly to root my sensation in another thread and advised me to look here with regards to flashing a new ROM with s-on so here I am. It is because your guides are so clear, straight forward and easy to understand that I am asking your advice/opinion on the following :-

I saw this ROM on another site which claims to be able to -turn your HTC Sensation into powerful HTC Sensation XE with Beats Audio technology and 1.5 GHz dual core! which is indeed fantastic and kind of what i wanted to achieve by rooting my phone, i.e. make it run faster. In your opinion is this possible?

If so, it also says --- It's necessary to flash new firmware package before flashing this ROM --- however your guide doesn't mention flashing new firmware as far as i can see.

As i said, your advice has helped me get to this point so I value your advice/opinion on this - also if there is a different ROM you would suggest then please let me know

Cheers

Click to expand...

unfortunately,you will not be able to change firmware while s-on. it is likley not really neccessary,as you are on ICS firmware. link me the rom in question in your post in the sensation forum(just so folks here dont get confused and think its for this device ) and ill have a look

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Your guide saved and solved my HTC desire S S-on issue..thank you very much..i have
HBOOT-2.00.0002 Rooted S-ON phone and i want to flash with ICS.so would you explain bit more on old firmware patching and give any special procedures to follow..again thanks a lot...

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the firmware patching is likely a scenario unique to the rezound,where a firmware change between GB and ICS neccesitated modifications to run an ICS rom on GB firmware,or vice versa. if the roms that youre flashing do not mention the need to be on "hboot x.xx" or make mention of any other specific patches to flash,etc. then it is not a situation that you need to worry much about.

i believe the desire s did get an official ICS,but you likely are on the newest firmware,wich hopefuly most roms would be designed for.

ill look into it and see if i see anything,but in the mean time just make sure you read the rom install instructions for special steps,and you should be fine

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A new newb here. I've been doing as told and read, read, read, reading as I embark on the world of root. So far I have followed this thread and others and have unlocked and rooted (su) but I'm still s-on and struggling with a debate to go s-off or not in my head. I've been looking at ROMs for the Sensation 4G (see phone description below) and i'm getting a little confused. So, that being said, I had a couple of questions for jedi master...

1) I loaded CW recovery into RAM as you instructed and all went well. I've done a nandroid backup and in looking at the backup folder, i noticed there was a recovery.img file. Since I did this backup just after unlocking, would this be my STOCK recovery? Should I save it for future flashing if needed?

2) I noticed that using the s-on techniques, I can't SuperCID. Okay maybe I can live with this. How will this limit my choice of ROMs? My stock rom is 3.32.531.14 but I don't see many based on this rom. I would like to try CM9 and CM10 but I don't know if they are compatible. I see that RevHD is based on 3.32.531.14, is this the better choice? Is this the kind or question that should drive me to s-off?

You guides have been awesome! I am an old time DOS and Windows programmer and have programmed some instrumentation so the cmd approach is very comfortable for me. I don't like the mystery of letting some super program do the work. I like to see what is happening. thank you for your help in advance....

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A new newb here. I've been doing as told and read, read, read, reading as I embark on the world of root. So far I have followed this thread and others and have unlocked and rooted (su) but I'm still s-on and struggling with a debate to go s-off or not in my head. I've been looking at ROMs for the Sensation 4G (see phone description below) and i'm getting a little confused. So, that being said, I had a couple of questions for jedi master...

1) I loaded CW recovery into RAM as you instructed and all went well. I've done a nandroid backup and in looking at the backup folder, i noticed there was a recovery.img file. Since I did this backup just after unlocking, would this be my STOCK recovery? Should I save it for future flashing if needed?if you had not permantly flashed a a recovery to the recovery partition,then the recovery in the nandroid should indeed be the stock recovery.it would not be a bad idea to keep it around in case you need to reflash it,but its not too big a deal,you can pull the image from the 3.32.531.14 ruu as well

2) I noticed that using the s-on techniques, I can't SuperCID. Okay maybe I can live with this. How will this limit my choice of ROMs? My stock rom is 3.32.531.14 but I don't see many based on this rom. I would like to try CM9 and CM10 but I don't know if they are compatible. I see that RevHD is based on 3.32.531.14, is this the better choice? Is this the kind or question that should drive me to s-off?it actually wont affect you too much. as long as you are on ICS firmware(you are) then you can run any ICS rom. the biggest issue is that you cannot downgrade back to gingerbread firmware,if you wanted to run a GB rom. tho in all fairness,unles syou constantly like to mess with and tinker with things,there isnt really much of a reason to go back to GB. ive run cm10,and a couple of the sense roms on the stock t mobile firmware.

having said that,there are a bunch of factory ruus for the sensation. i started running european ICS onths ago,prior to functional cm or t mobiles release.

IMO its almost required to be s-off and supercid to compeltely enjoy such a wonderful phone as the sensation. both are easily reverted back to stock if you need to.

just do your research and be sure youre comfortable doing the "wire trick" as alot of folks are somewhat imtimtaed by it.its commonly misconceptualized as a "short sircuit" causing a "soft brick" but thats really not the case. youre just grounding a certain pin in to complete a circuit to put the processor into a special diagnoistic mode.

my advice if you want to attempt s-off,is:
1)use a small spare sd that you dont care about
2)make sure youve looked at,and are familiar with all the instructions on jp bears website,and especially the troubleshooting tips: Unlimited.IO

You guides have been awesome! I am an old time DOS and Windows programmer and have programmed some instrumentation so the cmd approach is very comfortable for me. I don't like the mystery of letting some super program do the work. I like to see what is happening. thank you for your help in advance....

thanks for your nice words,i am in complete agreement with you about doing things manually vs running a tool. that is why i write my guides the way i do. i personally think the cmd window is fun,and it is good for folks to have some basic knowledge to use it,as phones become more and more complex.

my only request is to keep the sensation specific questions inthis thread to a mimumum,as to keep confusion down for rezund owners. i really should replicate this thread in the sensation forum. in the mean time,feel free to post there,or here if its not too specific,ill be happy to help